Gender Equality

Appelons-la Magda. Le nom est inventé, mais l’histoire est vraie. Elle est née au Lesotho il y a 35 ans. Sa vie illustre le fléau que subissent les femmes en termes de violences physiques, sexuelles et psychologiques.

Your brother was a great judge and statesman, among the first to understand the real dimensions of the mafia phenomenon and the importance of judicial cooperation. His work and legacy have helped to change the strategies to combat organized crime. His path has been defined by the spirit of sacrifice and the awareness of risks. He was born and he lived in Sicily and was surrounded by forms of acceptance and resignation caused by the Mafia. What was his relationship with his land? Can you tell us about how he developed his strength and determination in Sicily?

Foreign direct investment (FDI) and multinational enterprises (MNEs) are important sources of financing for developing countries. In this context, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has a long track-record of looking at both spillovers from FDI and gender equality. The policy study on investment by transnational corporations and gender provided a preliminary review of the academic literature on the impact of foreign investment on gender policy and practice, focusing on the wage and employment effects, and the related potential for women’s empowerment (UNCTAD, 2014). In addition, the 2020 World Investment Report (UNCTAD, 2020a) describes that the world’s leading multinational enterprises are increasing their gender equality reporting and policies, contributing to broader female representation and positive development impacts. Finally, several of the papers in this special issue served as background research for the UNCTAD (forthcoming) policy report on The International Transmission of Gender Policies and Practices: The Role of Multinational Enterprises. This original academic research was presented at an expert group meeting in May 2020, which brought together researchers, practitioners, and policymakers to discuss tangible policy recommendations and development impacts, while formally validating the quality of the research as part of the review process.

We study an often-overlooked factor behind gender inequality: globalization, in particular, foreign direct investment (FDI). Building on a growing literature that studies the impact of trade and FDI on gender inequality, we test whether foreign-owned firms exhibit a different gender wage gap (GWG) than firms with domestic ownership, using unique South African administrative matched employer-employee data. We find that the unconditional GWG is substantially smaller in foreign-owned firms than in firms with domestic ownership. We also find that for foreign-owned firms this difference is reversed once we control for a large set of fixed effects. In our preferred specification, foreign-owned firms have a larger GWG of about 2.4 percentage points. The share of women employed in foreign firms is lower than in firms with domestic ownership, in contrast to similar studies, which may indicate an underlying inequality in opportunities for women within a developing country context.

Government policy and private sector practice have the ability to spread gender equality, which can have an impact on growth and development. Over the past years, an upsurge has been observed in trade agreements that carve out space for gender issues in their agendas. The same is not true for international investment treaties. Foreign direct investment inflows can lead to more opportunities for women in the job market but may also exacerbate disparities. This paper aims to address and compare the role and effect of gender provisions in trade and investment agreements, and to shed light on additional policies that may be needed to ensure that governments and multinational enterprises address gender constraints.

This paper investigates how the interplay between foreign direct investment (FDI) and the availability of technology affects labour market outcomes for women in Viet Nam. Using household surveys, we explore the relationship between industrial exposure to FDI, access to technology, and employment and wages. We find that FDI is associated with increases in employment and wages by more in hightechnology areas of the country. In areas of the country with weak technology, foreign investment is associated with lower employment and lower wages, particularly for men. Together, these results highlight the importance of absorptive capacity; that is, to truly benefit from foreign investment, the domestic economy needs a sound education system and established technology. We also find that an equal increase in foreign investment in high-tech provinces is associated with larger increases in top wages for men than for women. In general, these results suggest that foreign investment may be associated with a rising gender wage gap at the high end of the wage distribution.

This paper analyses the effect of foreign ownership on female employment using micro-level data from the Chilean Manufacturing Survey. Particularly, it examines whether foreign-acquired firms hire proportionately more female workers than domestic firms. To control for the possible endogeneity of the foreign acquisition decision, we use propensity score matching combined with a difference-in- differences approach. In addition, we compare firms operating in the same industry-year. Our results show that foreign ownership increases the share of female workers within the firm. One year after acquisition the share of female workers is 1.64 percentage points higher in acquired firms than in non-acquired firms, and this figure increases to 3.55 percentage points two years after acquisition. When we separate female workers into skilled and unskilled categories, we observe that the positive effect of foreign acquisition is present only for skilled women. One year after acquisition, the share of skilled women is 4.60 percentage points higher in acquired firms than in non-acquired ones, and two years after acquisition this figure increases to 6.63 percentage points. We also present evidence that foreign acquisition increases the share of skilled women only when the acquired firm was not an exporter before its acquisition, supporting Becker’s (1957) theory on taste- based discrimination.

This book is a valuable reference document for the study of the evolution of contemporary socioeconomic life, marked by radical changes in structures, behaviours, methods of production and consumption, and rules of the social game. The current changes are of a “revolutionary” nature and thus make possible the vision of the future, which is necessary to decide on investments (material or immaterial). The uncertain dominates. Optimistic thinkers or actors believe that insofar as nothing is safe, everything is possible. But we still have to understand what is desirable, necessary or possible, because opportunities and risks are linked. The analysis of key success factors that are, or have been, actually operational is therefore of the highest interest.

As the green bond market continues to develop and assume a critical role as a post-pandemic vehicle for supporting a balanced economic rebuild and credible transition efforts, policymakers must reassess the current disclosure regime. This paper derives findings from Bayesian games to demonstrate that the prevailing labelling regime for green bonds is susceptible to the adverse selection problem; due to informational asymmetries, allocative inefficiencies arising from capital misallocation to inherently “non-green” bonds may ensue. To prevent the erosion of confidence in the market segment and support the potential of impact finance instruments to affect positive social and environmental change, this paper draws on established game theory frameworks to inform recommendations for policyled solutions to uphold the market’s credibility. These recommendations concern the integration of a regulatory infrastructure, a centralized ongoing audit under an “exogenously costly” regime and the introduction of a clearer course for legal recourse against issuers that mislabel bonds.

International business in the past century has largely been the domain of large multinational enterprises and banks, as well as small exporting and importing companies. The scope of international business activity has grown in recent years, and today there are many State-owned companies involved in international business activities, as well as financial investors rather than only industrial or commercial companies undertaking foreign direct investment (FDI). Government policy toward international business has largely been supportive since the 1990s, while concerns have arisen particularly in regard to the activities of State-owned enterprises and also the activities of non-traditional investors such as investment funds. To achieve the greatest benefits from FDI and trade, governments need to understand which companies are making the key decisions in global value chains and to collaborate in rule-setting and in guiding companies to pursue desirable activities and to limit non-business goal-seeking.

Why does aggregate foreign direct investment (FDI) fall with distance? We conjecture that high trade costs adversely affect FDI entry decisions in a dynamic setting, even when controlling for previous export experience in foreign markets. We test this hypothesis using Japanese firm-level data for the period of 1995–2018, and find that the probability of FDI entry decreases with distance. We conclude that trade costs limit a firm’s ability to assess foreign market uncertainty. As a result, a firm may exit a foreign market before realizing the potential profitability and never establish an affiliate there. This result is highly relevant for policymakers, as it proves that trade liberalization and FDI facilitation policies may reinforce each other, resulting in a compound effect for both exports and FDI.

Countries attract foreign investors, “entrants”, to invest and venture by employing policy programmes and marketing strategies. Country attractiveness for foreign investors relates to international competitiveness. Instruments building a formal status, such as golden visas and citizenship, are used to attract individual foreign investors and their families. These are often cosmopolitan people, i.e. global citizens but also global diasporans. They contribute to the economy, ideas and transnational entrepreneurial ecosystems. These policy instruments are criticized partly due to missing legitimacy, partly due to concerns about geopolitics and international crime. However, diasporic investors manifest different motivations and commitments, making them particular. This study examines what kind of investor programmes are offered to different foreign migrant investors and whether they address diasporic ties. It presents a country comparison of investor policy pathways towards citizenship. It contributes to the literature on migrant investment and policymaking.

Direct exporting activities and outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) are two types of internationalization that differ in firms’ opportunities, resources and risks. We study home-country institutional factors for internationalization and empirically investigate the direct and joint effects of export regulations, credit markets and corruption in explaining exporting and OFDI from a country. Using country-level data from 96 developed and developing countries between 2000 and 2018, we test a series of hypotheses and examine nonlinearity in the relationships. The results of the study suggest that export regulations partially affect exporting but do not affect OFDI. Access to financial resources can be critical in parts for both exports and OFDI. The findings also show that corruption can have different implications for exports and OFDI. The interactions of corruption with export regulations and credit markets reveal some unexpected and counter-intuitive results, highlighting the importance of distinguishing between the direct and indirect (joint) effects of business environment factors and corruption on exports and OFDI. The results of the study contain important information for policymakers.

This paper investigates the dynamic relationship between perceived corruption and foreign direct investment (FDI) in Egypt during the period 1970–2019. Using a novel back-casting methodology, it extrapolates perceived corruption time series between 1970 and 1980. The results of the Johansen cointegration technique and the multivariate vector error correction model show a positive relationship between perceived corruption and FDI, supporting the “greasing the wheels” effect of corruption. This positive association can be explained by several factors, such as the cross-interdependence of rent-generating assets with perceived corruption and FDI, and the use of FDI data based on the balance of payments that has growing financial-flows and phantom-FDI components. The findings of this paper have important policy implications. Improving the fundamental governance structure in Egypt should be accompanied by a comprehensive investment facilitation strategy to compensate for the removal of “grease” from the “wheels”.

This article seeks to explain recent decisions by countries to terminate their existing bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and revisit their commitment to future international investment agreements (IIAs). It argues that BITs, transnational corporations (TNCs), host States and international arbitration institutions form a decentralized system of global governance of foreign direct investment (FDI), based on insights from the fields of international political economy and international law, and that the nonmarket strategies of these TNCs have not only shaped the contours of this system but have also prompted host States to reform this system, from the perspective of a “political bargaining model”. The article illustrates this argument through the case of South Africa, which terminated its BITs with several European countries as a response to cases of investor–State dispute settlement (ISDS) and has sought to redefine its engagement with this system of global governance as a result.

This paper evaluates the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB) recently proposed by the European Commission. We find that if the CCCTB is introduced as it is currently proposed (including loss consolidation), then it is likely to impose large tax revenue costs of about one fifth of the corporate tax base. Second, we show that an application of the CCCTB proposals at only the European Union (EU) level would overlook the extent of profit shifting out of the EU and could lock in further unnecessary revenue losses. Third, major EU profit-shifting countries such as Luxembourg, Ireland and the Netherlands may experience significant revenue losses. Based on our analysis, the main policy recommendation is to consider extending the approach to a worldwide system, which would simultaneously deal with profit shifting within and out of the EU, and appears to offer the best prospect for revenue-positive, welfare-enhancing reform. For this to be viable, an immediate priority is to collate cross-country-comparable data and provide precise assessments of the range of policy scenarios.

This research explores the enablers of emerging-market firms (EMFs) leapfrogging in the internationalization process. Although many studies on rapid internationalization focus on exporting activities, we expand the concept to a higher-commitment entry mode: foreign direct investment (FDI). In addition, we investigate the role of an understudied force, foreign multinational enterprises (MNEs) in emerging markets, in enabling rapid internationalization of EMFs. Our hypotheses are tested using 1,612 first-time outward FDI projects from China between 2000 and 2014. The largely supported results suggest that minority foreign ownership and colocation with foreign MNEs allow EMFs to leapfrog certain stages in the establishment chain. Our findings offer alternative explanations, besides the government steward logic, to EMFs’ international expansion and contribute to the understanding, from a policy standpoint, that encouraging foreign-local partnerships is conducive to host-country industrial upgrading.

Building on a sociology theory of space, we conceptualize physical geography as separated from its constructed connotations and suggest that the impact of geographic location on countries’ attraction for foreign direct investment (FDI) is contingent upon their constructed qualities – that is, their unilateral characteristics and connectivity to other countries. Quantile regression analyses confirm these predictions and show notable variations across the distribution of FDI. The findings show that geography is not destiny and should rather be treated as an endogenous country characteristic whose consequences for FDI are subject to actions of policymakers and firms. Subsequent analyses show that the level of economic development affects the relationships between the physical and constructed consequences of geography on FDI, introducing significant differences between developed and developing countries. We outline the role for policy in shaping the contingencies that affect the relationships between geographic location and FDI.

Esta publicación analiza el complejo fenómeno de la violencia armada (diferente al conflicto armado) y presenta estrategias para proteger a las niñas, niños y adolescentes en contextos de violencia armada en la comunidad. Brinda visibilidad a la urgente necesidad de colocar a la niñez en el centro de las políticas y medidas que sean adoptadas en materia de temas asociados a la seguridad a fin de construir comunidades seguras, amigables y sostenibles.

The study builds on the National Green Export Review (NGER) of Vanuatu and leverages UNCTAD expertise in key analytical areas, including non tariff measures, voluntary sustainability standards (VSS), the trade agriculture gender nexus, and pro poor structural rural diversification through trade. Invaluable support was provided by the Government of Vanuatu, in particular, the Department of Industry, which generously shared information, facilitated multi stakeholder consultations and reviewed the final draft. The information in this report has been gathered from various sources, including interviews with key stakeholders in the country. To this purpose, missions were carriedout in Port Vila, Vanuatu, in 2017 and 2018. Interviews were conducted with public and private stakeholders, including representatives from the Department of Industry, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Department of Women’s Affairs, the National Statistics Office, the Government Chief Information Officer, the private sector, International Organisations and the donor community.

C’est la troisième édition d’un document d’orientation sur la situation actuelle, les tendances et les défis du transport par voie navigable sur les voies de navigation intérieure européennes d’importance internationale dans la région de la Commission économique pour l’Europe. Le livre blanc décrit l’état actuel du réseau de voies navigables E, l’évolution du cadre institutionnel et réglementaire de la navigation intérieure depuis 2011, les programmes et activités récents de la CEE, de l’Union européenne et d’autres organisations internationales. Le livre blanc identifie huit domaines prioritaires pour rendre les transports par voies navigables dans la région de la CEE plus durable et concurrentiel, et formule des recommandations de politique générale pour les actions de la CEE pour chacun d’eux.

2020 marks the 25th anniversary of the adoption of the Beijing Platform for Action. It also marks the first time that progress on the implementation of the Platform is reviewed in light of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted in 2015. This report therefore takes an integrated approach to reporting on progress, gaps and challenges related to the advancement of gender equality and women’s rights across six dimensions that link the Platform’s critical areas of concern and the Sustainable Development Goals. It finds that there have been important gains since the adoption of the Beijing Platform in 1995, but that progress towards gender equality has stalled and even reversed in some areas in recent years. Across the globe women’s movements, energized by young feminists at the helm, are challenging slow and piecemeal progress and are impatient for systemic change. World leaders can learn from the ways in which these movements work across silos and political boundaries, seeing their work to advance the rights of women and girls as inextricably linked to the achievement of economic, social and environmental justice for all. The report features their voices that must be heard and acted upon. The report also highlights catalytic policies and programmes under each of the six dimensions as well as a number of cross-cutting strategies that can accelerate the implementation of the entire Platform for Action for this generation and the next.

This publication is the first Asia-Pacific report that comprehensively maps out the intersections between gender and environment at the levels of household, work, community and policy. It examines gender concerns in the spheres of food security, agriculture, energy, water, fisheries and forestry, and identifies strategic entry points for policy interventions. Based on a grounded study of the reality in the Asia-Pacific region, this report puts together good practices and policy lessons that could be capitalized by policymakers to advance the agenda of sustainable development in Asia and the Pacific.

The primary objective of the manual is to foster a gender perspective in national statistics. Recognizing that systematic integration of gender in regular statistical activities is still missing in many countries, the manual has been designed to guide a sustainable development of gender statistics. The manual provides concrete information needed to accomplish three main goals: (a) achieve a comprehensive coverage of gender issues in data production activities; (b) incorporate a gender perspective into the design of surveys or censuses, by taking into account gender issues and gender-biases in measurement; and (c) improve data analysis and data presentation and deliver gender statistics in a format easy to use by policy makers and planners.

Latin America has extremely high levels of social and economic inequality as well as insufficient social expenditure despite registering the highest growth in per capita GDP since the 70’s. This work provides the latest estimates for the countries of Latin America regarding poverty, residential segregation, impact of social expenditure on people’s well-being and psycho-social divides. It also analyses internal migrations as well as health programmes for indigenous people and women.

In the last four years, Latin America has turned in its best performance in twenty-five years in economic and social terms. Progress with poverty reduction, falling unemployment, improving income distribution in several countries and a strong upswing in numbers of jobs are the main factors underlying the positive trend in a number of the region's countries. The first two chapters of in this report look at the way the main social indicators have behaved in the last few years. The following two chapters address matters that, for different reasons, have come to figure prominently on government agendas.

The central theme of this edition of Social Panorama of Latin America is social inequality, seen as a fundamental challenge and obstacle to sustainable development. Some of the axes and aspects of social inequality are addressed, drawing attention to how they intersect with and reinforce one another. The different chapters will examine inequalities in the distribution of income (personal and functional) and property; inequalities over the course of the life cycle; time-use inequalities between men and women; and the situation of Afrodescendent populations as an example of ethnic and racial inequalities. Recent trends in the amount of public resources available to finance social policies capable of tackling poverty and inequality and of promoting inclusive social development are also analysed.

In this edition of Social Panorama of Latin America, ECLAC has addressed the questions posed by the countries of the region in three major areas: income inequality between individuals and households and how these relate to labour market dynamics; the evolution of poverty and its determinants; and the effects of pension systems on equality. The poverty analysis in this 2017 edition is based on a major update of the methodology used; this offers improved comparability between countries, which is an essential input for conducting an overall analysis of how poverty and its determinants have evolved. This effort has led to the creation of a new regional data series. The new statistical series using the national data will be made public by ECLAC in the first half of 2018 once the consultations with the respective countries have been concluded. In this edition, as well as continuing the analysis of the dimensions of social inequality given in previous years, Commission presents a new study of the demographic context and labour market inequalities, and how these relate to the coverage and quality of pension benefits.

This annual report examines the dynamics of paid employment in care activities in Latin American countries, as well as household expenditure on such work, and proposes normative criteria for public policymaking in this sphere. It also covers 1) poverty trends and determining factors in Latin America; 2) income distribution and social spending trends in the region; and 3) situation of disabled people in Latin American and Caribbean countries.

El tema central de esta edición del Panorama Social de América Latina es la desigualdad social, considerada como un desafío fundamental y un obstáculo para el desarrollo sostenible. Se abordan algunos de los ejes y dimensiones de la desigualdad social, llamando la atención sobre la forma en que estos se entrecruzan y se potencian mutuamente. En sus distintos capítulos se examinarán las desigualdades en la distribución del ingreso (personal y funcional) y de la propiedad, las desigualdades a lo largo del ciclo de vida, las desigualdades en el uso del tiempo entre hombres y mujeres, y la situación de las poblaciones afrodescendientes como una de las manifestaciones de las desigualdades étnico-raciales. Asimismo, se analizan las tendencias recientes en cuanto a los recursos públicos disponibles para financiar políticas sociales capaces de hacer frente a la pobreza y la desigualdad y promover un desarrollo social inclusivo.

The United Nations Disarmament Yearbook, Volume 43 (Part I): 2018 is a compilation of the resolutions and decisions of the 73rd session of the General Assembly, their voting patterns in the General Assembly and the First Committee, lead sponsors, sponsors and co-sponsors, references to First Committee report and dates of adoption.

This is the third edition of a policy paper on the current situation, trends and challenges in Inland Water Transport on European inland waterways of international importance in the region of the Economic Commission for Europe. The White Paper describes the current status of the E Waterway Network, the evolution of the institutional and regulatory framework for inland navigation since 2011, recent programmes and activities of UNECE, the European Union and other international organizations. The White Paper identifies eight priority areas to make IWT in the ECE region more sustainable and competitive, and comes up with policy recommendations for UNECE actions for each of them.

The United Nations Disarmament Yearbook, Volume 44 (Part I): 2019 is a compilation of the resolutions and decisions of the 74th session of the General Assembly, their voting patterns in the General Assembly and the First Committee, lead sponsors, sponsors and co-sponsors, references to First Committee report and dates of adoption.

The HeForShe Champions initiative confronts the gender inequalities faced in three key pillars of society: government, work and academia. Each Champion has made specific, stretching and measurable commitments towards achieving gender equality. This Report updates their progress over the past year, with hard data on gender representation and highlights of key achievements. This publication is packed with ideas turned into reality. It is a testament to the vision and hard work of everyone involved in the initiative.

Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, shrinking working hours, increased care burdens and heightened violence have exacerbated the challenges that women and girls face. Unless action is taken, by 2021 around 435 million women and girls will be living in extreme poverty, including 47 million pushed into poverty as a result of COVID-19. This publication from UN Women presents the latest evidence on the multiple impacts of the pandemic on women and girls, including how the crisis is affecting extreme poverty, employment, health, unpaid care and violence against women and girls. Policy action is urgently needed to protect women’s health and well-being, including ensuring access to sexual and reproductive health services. The response to COVID-19 must also take into account the risks borne by essential health workers, the majority of whom are women. The report calls for gender-responsive policies, including the introduction of economic support packages for vulnerable women, as well as long-term investments in social protection systems that reach all women and girls. Additionally, improving gender data collection and expanding research on the gendered impacts of COVID-19 will be vital to understand the pandemic’s impact on different groups of women and girls.

Malgré ses difficultés pour faire face aux défis qui ont mis à l’épreuve les capacités de l’État et de la population à sauvegarder l’unité nationale et la sécurité, le Mali n’est pas resté à l’écart des transformations induites par les technologies de l’information et de la communication (TIC). Son gouvernement a lancé des initiatives dans les domaines de l’administration électronique et des infrastructures des TIC afin de tirer profit des opportunités fournies par le développement de ces dernières, notamment à travers l’adoption du référentiel Mali Numérique 2020, une stratégie nationale pour le développement de l’économie numérique. Une nouvelle dynamique régionale, impulsée par les Ministres du Commerce de l’Union Économique et Monétaire Ouest Africaine (UEMOA) dans la Déclaration ministérielle en date du 29 septembre 2017 visant à définir un plan de travail régional pour le développement du commerce électronique, permettra de soutenir les efforts du Mali dans ce domaine. Une première étape dans la préparation de ce plan a été initiée par la Commission de l’UEMOA, en coopération avec la CNUCED, avec l’organisation d’un atelier régional sur le commerce électronique, organisé à Ouagadougou du 9 au 11 octobre 2018. L’impulsion d’institutions régionales telles que l’UEMOA et la Communauté Économique des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest (CEDEAO), a encouragé les États membres à harmoniser les politiques d’intégration économique, y compris le cadre réglementaire applicable au commerce électronique, et de nouvelles réformes doivent être conduites face aux développements rapides de la digitalisation.

The Survey 2018-2019 observes that the Arab region experienced an economic recovery with a growth rate of 2.3% in 2018, up from 1.7% the year before. This recovery was largely attributed to hydrocarbon sector-led growth in the region’s oil-exporting countries, particularly GCC countries. This growth momentum will continue at a modest pace of 2.6% in 2019 and further increase to 3.4% for 2020. Notwithstanding such positive prospect, the region remains linked to geopolitical uncertainties, which are further exacerbated by a number of ongoing intraregional diplomatic rifts and armed conflict. Meanwhile, the Survey 2018-2019 claims that the main challenge facing nowadays the region is its delicate fiscal situation as several Arab countries have already established new energy subsidy systems, aimed at maintaining affordable energy prices against oil price fluctuation. Employing CGE models, the Survey 2018-2019 demonstrates that reducing energy subsidy generates a fiscal space for governments. If the ‘saved’ amounts are totally directed to the reduction of fiscal deficit, fiscal sustainability could be enhanced but economic growth and job creation will be negatively affected. Such simulation result allows policymakers to assess the reform options that promote an inclusive and sustainable development.